123. Embracing the force of nature as a Highly Sensitive Person with Cam Nichols

In this episode of Sensitive Success, I talk to Cam Nichols about embracing sensitivity and being a force of nature. We discuss emotions, authenticity, mindset, and connective relationships for sensitive individuals.
 
Cam shares his journey as a highly sensitive person and offers a free quiz to help identify your primary element. Join us for a powerful conversation on navigating the world as a sensitive changemaker.

Chapters
00:00 - Intro
02:41 - Cam's Life Journey
04:54 - Why Do We Need to Celebrate Sensitivity?
06:56 - What Is the Force of Nature?
09:20 - What Are the HSP Elemental Energies?
17:13 - Four Effective Questions to Ask to Get Started
21:18 - Cam's FREE Element Quiz
23:28 - Cam's Final Message
26:20 - Outro

Cam's Free Elemental Quiz: click here

Know more about Cam's work at:
https://coachwithcam.com

Connect  on his social media account:
Instagram: @coachwithcam

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Transcript

Frida Kabo: 0:00

Hi, it's Frida Kabo. I've had some great conversations with awesome people, and I thought why keep the conversations in the archive. I want to share them with you. So here is one of the conversations from the Sensitive Success Summit. Enjoy. Welcome to the Sensitive Success Podcast, where we explore the unique challenges and opportunities that comes with being a sensitive changemaker in today's world. I'm your host, Frida Kabo, and I have spent the last decade recreating my life. I moved from Sweden to New Zealand and now live in the beautiful bush with my husband and two kids, homeschooling and creating a life and business that works for me with the help of my sensitivity and support others to do the same. I'm excited to share conversations with experts, thought leaders, and fellow sensitive people who also see the world through the lens of sensitivity. Thank you so much for being here, because it means that you're creating sensitive success too, which is precisely what the world needs. Let's get started. One thing that I'm passionate about is helping sensitives to be more you. So, in this conversation, we're talking to Cam Nichols about how we can be more of the force of nature. Cam is a compassionate guide and empowerment coach for sensitive souls, devoted to helping you find your voice so you can stop hiding and start living. Certified as a life coach, his academic and professional voyage through psychology, leadership, training, business, and organizational culture shape the foundations of Cam's transformative work. Cam is a paradoxical force of nature, shy yet dramatic, soulful yet sassy, emotional yet empowered. And Cam's mission is to extend this empowerment to those who felt broken or isolated by a world that sometimes feels too harsh. His vision is clear. Sensitive individuals, empowered from within, shaping a kinder and more sustainable world. that foster a broader paradigm of living, being, and thriving. I love, love, love that. Welcome, Cam.

Cam Nichols: 2:09

Thank you for having me. I know I'm like, tearing up almost hearing it, which is not a reaction I expected. But it just, it, hearing that being read is just like, it's such a good reminder of progress. I didn't always view myself that way, and so hearing it is, yeah, I just get emotional. I'm all about emotions, so it makes sense, I guess.

Frida Kabo: 2:33

Yeah, yeah, I love that. Beautiful. Yeah, so tell us a bit more about your journey and how you came to this point.

Cam Nichols: 2:41

Yeah, so I first learned about sensitivity, Say, like I was back in like mid 2000s, I think I was still in high school and like, it's kind of appeared in my life every so often, I got all, I hear about it and I'm like, Oh my gosh, that resonates. Like that's totally who I am. And then life goes on and I kind of forget about it and then it pops up again. And in my work life, when I switched from corporate America over to. coaching. I was really focused on like helping introverts, like specifically shy introverts because I'm a shy introvert myself and it has its own separate challenges of life. Then I started to learn more like HSP, highly sensitive, started to pop back up in the research and just the stuff that I was reading and listening to and I was like, this speaks more to what is happening because like not all highly sensitive people are introverts, but a large majority of them are. Right. And so the things just kind of married together, but I, I've always just felt very emotional and dramatic and, uh, intuition has always played a big role in my life. So when I learn about HSPs and the deep feeling and the deep thinking, and The natural intuition that we have to kind of see the world differently, those kind of things all kind of came together and I was just like, how can I not talk about this? Like, in truly what I'm doing, like in my own healing journey, with like depression, anxiety, and suicidality, and trauma, and just healing from that after emotionally shutting down, it made so much sense of, oh, that's why I emotionally shut down. That's why I emotionally shut down was because I was so sensitive and I didn't understand it. It was kind of like a messy explanation.

Frida Kabo: 4:42

This is perfect. Perfect. Yeah. So yeah, this is the Sensitive Success Summary. So why do you feel it's important to go together and celebrate sensitivity like this?

Cam Nichols: 4:54

I think understanding our sensitivity is, it's imperative in order for us to live harmoniously in the world. So I think that we as highly sensitive people, we have These gifts and these superpowers that allow us to navigate the world differently and be an example to other people in how to live differently, because I think a lot of the world, as things are shifting, that's kind of what we're seeing is like the sensitivity of life. That richness has kind of been sucked out, and it's the same with us, right? Like, we try to fit into this mold, doesn't quite work, and we end up feeling like really bland and really gray and drained. And so, us being able to come together as sensitive people, And be in community, it's almost like a concentrated power source, I guess, for lack of a better phrase, it's just like, when we all come together, we just radiate in such a powerful way. And it's almost, it can't be denied when we embrace more of who we are as sensitive people, I mean, similar to your story and my story, right? It's like. We learn and we can't help but share. And so coming together, I love that you put this summit together for us to create community and find each other and. learn from each other, because it's, it's just such a potent force when we do. And with a lot of us being introvert, it's kind of like, unite from our houses individually from home.

Frida Kabo: 6:42

Exactly. It's perfect. Love that. But yeah, I'm so glad that you're here and celebrating with us. And so you, you talk about being a force of nature, tell us a bit more about that.

Cam Nichols: 6:56

I've always sought balance in my life. And for the longest time I was never good at it, but because I've always been drawn to, like, magic and witchy things and, and nature is a big part of that both in, like, the real world and the imaginary fictitious world of like, which is in magic. And so I've learned a lot about the elements and there's lots of different, I don't think Pantheon is the right word, but a lot of different belief systems and like what elements are like the main elements, right. But most of them have earth, air, water, fire, and spirit. And when I see all of those combined and I see those different aspects radiated in individuals. Like different characteristics of each element, like sensitives or emotional associated with water element fire. We're passionate and it won't go through every element. But when we embrace those elements and we learn to use them and accept those pieces of ourselves. That sometimes we don't always like because I think that's the beauty of nature, right? It truly is a balance. We can be as beautiful as like the ebb and flow of the ocean, but we can also be really emotional and destructive as a hurricane. And so learning how to embrace those things and not judge the hurricane when we are in that type of energy. And learn how to embrace it and learn from it and harness it. I think that's kind of that potent force that I'm talking about, right? There's just this level of. intuitive knowing and understanding of nature and the world and how it works and how it can work and what the potential is to me that's being the force of nature is embracing all of it, because then when we embrace it, we can use it. We just have to stop judging it first in order to actually embrace it.

Frida Kabo: 9:00

I love that. Yeah, and I think that a lot of those who are watching this can relate to our stories where we try to do what everyone else does. We saw around us and then we started coming into to ourselves and maybe have struggled with depression and anxiety as well How do you see that? We can start working with our force of nature.

Cam Nichols: 9:25

So when I think about How to start working with it? Like, I have a quiz on my website. It's the HSP Elemental Energy type quiz. And you basically take this quiz, and it tells you what's your primary element. And then it walks you through what that looks like when you're aligned versus unaligned, and how to, how to switch, and kind of, you know, get into more alignment. And as I created that and the people that I've coached, I've actually noticed like there are four main areas that we as sensitive people need to understand and find balance in, in order to really thrive. To really become that force of nature. And I've not associated them with the elements yet. But, maybe that's something down the line. But it's like, we need to understand our emotions. Like, emotional regulation and emotional resilience. Like, our emotions. Like, understanding where our emotions are. Come from how we generate them, how they're created. That's what allows us to kind of step into this confident place and not judge them because how often are we told like, oh, you're so emotional. Oh, you're crying. That makes me uncomfortable. People don't say that, but let's be honest. We can feel that energy.

Frida Kabo: 10:43

Yeah.

Cam Nichols: 10:44

Right. And it's like, no, like this is, yeah, I cry. I cry all the time. Cause I, I feel, I see things that you know, don't necessarily do or perceive or whatever. So I think that's one of the big things is really understanding our emotions. I was going to say, do you want me to talk about the

Frida Kabo: 11:04

other four? Yeah,

Cam Nichols: 11:07

because yeah, the, uh, the other one is authenticity alignment, right? Truly. When we stop judging our emotions, we can really then start to examine the things that make us, us. What are our values? What are our strengths? What does it mean to authentically be us and show up as ourselves? Because so much of what we've learned and what's similar in our stories, and I'm sure is similar with a lot of the viewers, is we're given these roles in life. I call it in what I'm talking about. I often call it social conditioning, right? We just we're taught how to be a certain way. We're taught how to think a certain way, and it starts before we're even born, right? I mean, we can go into generational stuff, but, like, think about a child in the womb. You have certain milestones that you are expected to hit. Otherwise, something is wrong, right? Then you're born. And then those milestone milestones begin. Then you go into the education system. And there's those milestones, and this is what good looks like, this is how you're supposed to behave, this is how you're supposed to think, right? Then you go, you graduate from school, and you go into the workforce, and your boss is there to tell you, this is what good looks like, this is how you should function, this is, this is what, how you need to start thinking about things. And it's like we take so much of that on just because of our highly sensitive nature, right? That deep feeling, the deep thinking, the deep processing. We take those roles on, and that way of being, and then it's like one day we wake up and we're like, how did we get here? What happened? This isn't who I am. I don't wear suits every day. I wear scarves. What's going on? And so please forgot where I was going with that. Like, just the idea of like truly being able to detangle ourselves from who we're taught we are supposed to be. That alone is just magical. And that's, I think that's another thing is like, we're all so different. And before we hit record, we were talking about how much we love diversity. Right? In the world. We're in different parts of the world. We live in different parts of the world. And it's because we can appreciate it. We can recognize that diversity isn't a threat. It's something to be cherished. And that comes from authenticity. I could probably talk about that for like another four hours. That's

Frida Kabo: 13:45

what I'm really

Cam Nichols: 13:45

passionate about.

Frida Kabo: 13:48

It's beautiful. I love it. But yeah, let's move on to the next

Cam Nichols: 13:51

one. Yeah. So then the third piece is the mindset, right? I think like depression, anxiety, and just the negative self talk that we kind of gain from other people, right? And that we kind of take on as our own identity. Understanding that mindset and learning how that mindset works is, that's a skill in and of itself, right? Uncovering who you are, learning how to deal with your emotions is a skill, really coming into who you are is a skill, managing your mind is a skill, and when you can do it, nothing, nothing can stand in your way. You can create change, you can, whether that's like change on like a global scale or whether that's just like in your day to day, I'm going to wake up and I'm going to do this because it feels good. I love myself, so therefore I'm going to have a salad today, or I love myself and I'm going to forgo the salad, I'm going to have a brownie instead. It's like there's, there's no judgment, but it's, it's truly owning that mindset and those stories that we tell ourselves about ourselves, other people and the rest of the world. And the fourth one is connective and supportive relationships. So again, I've kind of talked about like being an introvert. And the pandemic really kind of, even though like introverts, like we kind of celebrated, we're like, Oh, I don't want to see anybody. How amazing. Oh, I can't like we were in lockdown. Sorry, but I love you. Right? Like we got to experience that. But even still, it kind of put us into social atrophy, like some of our social skills. They've languished a little bit and this is part of why I love what you're doing with the summit and just your work, right? And just creating this community is because we as humans, we are meant to have community. We are meant to connect like it's highly sensitive people. Maybe we don't necessarily connect in. large groups or large parties and like we might be more selective in how we connect, but connection is important. And so learning how to set boundaries, learning how to communicate with other people, communicate our likes, communicate what we don't like. There's also this idea that I teach with my clients is like this idea of belonging. Oftentimes we believe that belonging is what other people offer to us. I teach it backwards. We are the ones who offer belonging. To everyone else. So learning how to invite people into our world rather than feel like we need to go out and try to fit into someone else's.

Frida Kabo: 16:33

Man, love that. Yeah.

Cam Nichols: 16:35

So it's like, yeah, understanding the emotions, your alignment into authenticity, your mindset, and then connective relationships. Those are like the four main areas that it's like, if you, if you want to thrive and feel whole, fulfilled, that's kind of what I've narrowed it down to after coaching hundreds of people. And. My own journey and a little bit.

Frida Kabo: 17:02

Yeah, I love that. And yeah, definitely agree. So important. And if someone is listening to this and agree as well and feel like they want to do all this, where do you recommend them to start? Because it's a lot.

Cam Nichols: 17:13

It is a lot. I know. I was like, do I share all of this? It is a lot. So I've. So out of those, the four sections, I've kind of come up with a question. So I want to give these four questions. And this is where I'd recommend you start, whether you journal, whether you just think about it. Start with these four questions and just see what comes up for you. So number one is what is the worst possible emotion you could experience? And why for me, I thought it was one thing, but I uncovered several years ago. I'm like, Disappointment. That's the worst because I felt it over and over and over again in my life. And I was just like, I, I completely avoided everything because I wanted to avoid disappointment. What is the worst possible emotion you could experience? And why? Because emotions. Even the ones we view negative are not, they're not there to harm us, right? They're just information. So the second question is, what is my biggest weakness? And how is it actually a strength? What's the positive intention behind me having this weakness? And again, this kind of plays into that, that we have, we have these judgments about ourselves. So like an example of this would be procrastination. Oh, I'm a huge procrastinator. Why do you think you procrastinate? What's the positive intention underneath procrastinating? Oh, it's because I'm doing things I don't really want to do. Right? So it's really interesting to see like, okay, what's your weakness? And how is it actually a strength? Procrastination is like, oh, it's telling me where I want to actually place my energy and what I want to create and contribute. Third question is where or from whom does my negative self talk originate or come from? So this kind of goes into that social conditioning aspect, right? It's like, is this something that I actually believe? Or is this something I kind of took on from someone or from somewhere? Because once you have awareness, then you can choose to do differently. You can choose to think differently. You can choose to adopt a different perspective. And as I said, that like one of your recent posts actually totally just came to my mind. I wish I could remember which one, but I think it was like three steps. And the second one, second step was like, choose. This helps you do that. That question. And then the fourth question is, how do I want to bring people into my world? So understand what your world is, right? But just like, yeah. How do I want to bring people in? I want to, do I like books? Do I like watching? Like I'm a huge, I love watching TV. Yeah. Yeah. And I used to make that think that I was like super lazy and uninteresting and, but it's like, no, it's how I get my recoup time, like how I recharge myself, but it's also what I love to talk to people about. So how do I want to bring people in? Oh my gosh, did you see that episode of Schitt's Creek? Like, ew, David. Right. So it's just like, how do you want to bring people and you want to share your world with them?

Frida Kabo: 20:27

Hmm. I love that. That is so powerful. So powerful question. And yeah, I really encourage everyone to dig into them in the way that you do your way. If it's generally not just wondering about them or. Yeah. Talking to them. The friend or whatever. You

Cam Nichols: 20:46

just see what comes up when you ask yourself them, is it an emotion? Is it an image? Is it a sound? Is it a memory? Because all like, it doesn't matter how you go about it, but just know when you notice what comes up. There's so much information that can be gleaned just from that awareness.

Frida Kabo: 21:05

And you also talked about the different, our different forces of nature as highly sensitive and you have a free quiz as well for this. Yeah. Can you tell us a bit more about that quiz? Yeah.

Cam Nichols: 21:18

Yeah.

Frida Kabo: 21:19

Yeah. The

Cam Nichols: 21:21

quiz. I'm really proud of it. I love it. Like it's, it's very much like intuition based in how I created it and just the knowledge that I have of the elements and their symbology. Is that a word? Symbolism. But like when you take it, you discover kind of which elements You, this is like your primary element, I guess, earth, air, fire, water, spirit. And there's an ebook that I emailed afterwards. So it's like, you have your, you get your detailed explanation, but then you also get to read the other elements too. And it helps you kind of understand what is your natural intuition, like how does it, how can it manifest? How can you keep an eye out for it and fine tune it? It talks about what are some common emotions and characteristics when you're in alignment. Um, when you're like, so like Earth is, is an example, is, uh, has a really strong, grounded energy. It's a leadership energy and so yeah. When you're aligned, you feel really grounded and connected, right, and compassionate. When you're not aligned, you do not feel grounded. You like. You want to kind of hide and seclude yourself. So it kind of goes into more of that. And then it's like, okay, if you need help getting out and like getting out of the unalignment back into alignment, here's some things to try. It's very detailed. Like the ebook in and of itself is like, it's over 40 pages. So like there's a lot of really good information in there to just help understand yourself in a different way than maybe you have.

Frida Kabo: 23:10

That's great. Yeah, we'll put the link here, go over and do it. And if you want to, you can let us know what your element is. I will definitely go and do it as well. It looks really interesting. So is there anything else that you would like to say to, to the sensitives that are listening? I know there's so much more we could talk about.

Cam Nichols: 23:28

I know. I didn't realize it was so long winded. I guess that's what happens when you're passionate about what you're talking about.

Frida Kabo: 23:33

Yeah.

Cam Nichols: 23:35

I think that the thing that I would leave you with is We often think that our emotions will overwhelm us and like if we really give into them and we really dive into them, especially the negative ones, despair, grief, anxiety, depression, there's this fear that we will get stuck and that we'll just stay there. And what I want to offer is that you won't stay there because that's not how nature works. That's not how emotions work and, and again, being able to dive in and it's okay to be afraid that you're going to get stuck and just continue to remind yourself of like, no, there's information in this and I, this will cycle out, but not being afraid of that deep emotional energy because a lot of the clients that I work with are people who feel like they have emotionally numbed themselves or emotionally shut down. And so I work a lot with them on removing judgment from emotion. And a lot of it's just, it's, it's fear based in this aspect. So it's like emotions, aren't things to run from. They can actually vary healing. And when you just released a podcast episode about this as well, about increasing emotional capacity, when you're willing to feel terrible, you also open yourself up to feel amazing, incredible things. And I'm constantly surprised as I increase that emotional capacity, how my life changes when I do. And it's a surprise every time,

Frida Kabo: 25:17

in the best way. Yeah. Yeah, I kind of get the picture of a waterfall when you're talking, like, if we try to put it down on top, it's going to seep out. But if we dare to just let it go, it can flow and you don't have to hold it all in. You can just let it go. It's nature.

Cam Nichols: 25:37

Yeah. It creates rainbows and it's refreshing and it's just beautiful.

Frida Kabo: 25:40

Beautiful. Love it. Wonderful. Thank you so, so much for sharing all your wisdom with us. As I said, there's so much more we could talk about, but thank you for, for this conversation. I really appreciate it. And I think those who are watching this did as well. And yeah, thank you for the work that you do in the world as well. It's so important.

Cam Nichols: 26:00

Same. Thank you for, for bringing me into this, allowing me to be part of it, and I, and just creating the community that you are. I feel very grateful, and Excited.

Frida Kabo: 26:14

Thank you. Yeah. So glad you're here. Thank you. Thank you for listening to Sensitive Success. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review and share it with someone who could benefit from this message. And come over and connect with me on Instagram at Frida Kabo. And remember, sensitivity is neither good or bad. It's what we make of it. Embrace your sensitivity and use it to create sensitive success your way.